diff --git a/applets/usage_compressed b/applets/usage_compressed
index 551b4b4ba..05ceafd4a 100755
--- a/applets/usage_compressed
+++ b/applets/usage_compressed
@@ -14,14 +14,21 @@ exec >"$target"
 
 echo 'static const char packed_usage[] ALIGN1 = {'
 
-# Extra effort to avoid using "od -t x1": -t is not available
-# in non-CONFIG_DESKTOPed busybox od
+## Breaks on big-endian systems!
+## # Extra effort to avoid using "od -t x1": -t is not available
+## # in non-CONFIG_DESKTOPed busybox od
+## 
+## "$loc/usage" | bzip2 -1 | od -v -x \
+## | $SED -e 's/^[^ ]*//' \
+## | $SED -e 's/ //g' \
+## | grep -v '^$' \
+## | $SED -e 's/\(..\)\(..\)/0x\2,0x\1,/g'
 
-"$loc/usage" | bzip2 -1 | od -v -x \
+"$loc/usage" | bzip2 -1 | od -v -t x1 \
 | $SED -e 's/^[^ ]*//' \
 | $SED -e 's/ //g' \
 | grep -v '^$' \
-| $SED -e 's/\(..\)\(..\)/0x\2,0x\1,/g'
+| $SED -e 's/\(..\)/0x\1,/g'
 
 echo '};'
 echo '#define SIZEOF_usage_messages' `expr 0 + $sz`